Sturgeon attacks ‘rape clause’

Plans to make mothers prove they have been raped to claim child benefits prompted angry exchanges between Nicola Sturgeon and Ruth Davidson, the Scottish Conservative leader.

Ms Davidson was greeted with calls of “shame, shame” at Holyrood when she refused to condemn the “rape clause” recently brought in by the UK government. Ms Sturgeon, the first minister, challenged Ms Davidson not to “pass the buck” on the child tax credit reform and “tell Scotland straight, do you support the rape clause in principle or do you, like me, think it is utterly abhorrent?” Ms Davidson replied: “If the first minister doesn’t like the two-child tax policy, she can change it.”